


Counting

by Thealmostrhetoricalquestion



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Bonding, Flirting, Fluff, Freckles, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, M/M, Mutual Pining, Post-Hogwarts, Sharing Clothes, Sharing a Bed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-13
Updated: 2018-03-13
Packaged: 2019-03-30 21:43:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13960632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thealmostrhetoricalquestion/pseuds/Thealmostrhetoricalquestion
Summary: Teddy has particularly strong feelings, and they mostly revolve around childhood sofas, strawberry cream biscuits, and James.





	Counting

**Author's Note:**

  * For [GoldenTruth813](https://archiveofourown.org/users/GoldenTruth813/gifts).



> Thank you to the lovely beta, L, for looking at this! And I really hope you like this, GoldenTruth813, because I adore your writing and wanted you to have something nice! <3

Teddy is in the kitchen, pouring over some old case files, when James pops into the building. He appears between one moment and the next, toothbrush sticking out of his mouth, dark hair puffed up all over the place, wearing an oversized Hufflepuff t-shirt that falls to mid-thigh and a pair of old boxers. He looks like a bewildered owl, eyes wide and that familiar, warm brown.

Teddy squints at him, mug of peppermint tea halfway to his lips. “Is that my shirt?”

“Wha’ am I doin’ here?” James asks, words garbled. He unsticks the toothbrush from behind his teeth and points it at Teddy, flecks of toothpaste falling onto Teddy’s clean tiles.

Teddy flails one hand in a nonplussed manner. “What do you mean, what are you doing here? You’re the one that Apparated here.” And then, “That  _ is _ my shirt. I’ve been looking for that for ages.”

James pulls his wand out from behind his ear and vanishes the mess in his mouth, quirking an eyebrow. He tugs on the hem of his shirt, pulling it down to reveal the sharp line of his freckled collarbone. “You want it back?”

“No, no.” Teddy swallows. He puts his mug a little too forcefully down on the counter and tea slops over the side, staining the parchment. He clears his throat, turns his attention back to James and says, “No, keep it.”

He doesn’t add that he likes seeing James in his clothes almost as much as he’d like seeing him out of them. He’s had practice at keeping thoughts like that to himself.

But James grins, smug and cocky, and it’s almost like he knows  _ exactly _ what Teddy’s thinking.

“Seriously, what are you doing here?” Teddy busies himself with mopping up the tea while James plops into the nearest chair, twirling his toothbrush like it’s a drumstick.

“I don’t actually know. As you can see, I didn’t exactly plan a visit.” He gestures at his clothes and frowns. “And I didn’t Apparate, either. It almost felt like a portkey, like a pull somewhere inside, but I didn’t touch anything out of the ordinary. You didn’t do anything?”

Teddy slowly lowers the conjured rag and presses a hand to his sternum. There had been a sharp tug there a few moments before James appeared, but he’d passed it off as a remnant of the wayward spell that hit him there yesterday, during duelling practice.

“I didn’t do anything, but I think I felt something. Try Disapparating,” Teddy suggests.

James shrugs, standing up and stepping forward with a cheerful wave. He disappears with a crack, and Teddy stares at the spot where he vanished, frowning. Maybe it was just a fluke, then, a little bit of accidental magic – although it’s odd for it to happen at James’s age, it’s not completely unheard of.

“Huh,” Teddy says, and then there’s a popping sound, and James Sirius Potter is in his lap. “ _ Oof _ . Merlin.”

After a few seconds, James stops looking shocked long enough to slap him lightly on the shoulder. “I’m not that heavy. What the bloody hell is going on?”

“I have no idea. Are you going to get off me?”

James adopts a thoughtful look that Teddy knows means trouble, and then he starts wriggling around, making himself more comfortable. Teddy’s hands fly to his hips in alarm, trying to hold him still, but it’s like trying to keep hold of a Flobberworm; James just settles in, loops his arms around Teddy’s neck, and grins innocently, his nose inches from Teddy’s.

“I don’t know, I’m quite comfy here.”

Teddy can smell soap and minty toothpaste, and he can count every freckle dusting James’s cheeks and nose, and all of that combined with the warm weight in his lap is enough to have him breathing shakily, something stirring in his chest. It’s exactly what he wants, and yet it’s not  _ enough _ . 

He casts a quick Pinching Charm, and James yelps, leaping out of Teddy’s lap and shooting him an indignant look. He rubs his arse ruefully.

“You could have at least put some effort into it,” James mutters, and Teddy decides that if he wants to leave with his sanity intact, he’s going to have to ignore the implications of  _ that _ .

“Stay there a minute. I want to try and figure this out.”

He stands up and walks to the kitchen doorway, and when he glances behind him, James is following him.

“Jamie,” Teddy says exasperatedly, but he pauses when James shakes his head emphatically.

“It’s not me. I’m not doing it on purpose.”

Teddy takes a cautious step backwards, watching James carefully. James stumbles forward, uncharacteristically clumsy. He’s always been graceful, although there was a time in his life, back when he was a gangly teenager, still growing into his long legs, where he was anything but elegant. He had spent a few months tripping on air and banging his head on door frames before he finally got used to his new body, and now he moves the way he flies, like poetry in motion. It drives Teddy insane. 

The pull is back again, settling somewhere in Teddy’s ribcage, an insistent tug that stops him in his tracks.

“Huh,” Teddy says, rubbing his chest. 

James’s grin is slow to form, but no less wide. “So, we’re stuck to each other? Like those old bonding things you read about in school.”

“You’re the only one who read about those, Jamie, because the bonding books are mostly in the Restricted Section, so that students didn’t accidentally glue their souls together.”

“So how’d  _ you  _ know about them then? How’d you know where they are?” 

His tone is indignant to hide his embarrassment. Teddy has always personally found it endearing, the way James puffs up over everything. He doesn’t get embarrassed often, in the eyes of everyone else, but that’s just because he hides it well. He shows off, employs misdirection, and Teddy and Al are the only ones that can see through it. 

“I know because you told me,” Teddy says, with a fond grin. “You can’t keep anything a secret for long.”

James snorts, mutters something along the lines of, “You wanna bet?”

Teddy ignores it. James says suggestive things all the time, but he never truly means any of them. Teddy taps his lip thoughtfully as he considers their situation, and James eventually gets antsy, fed up with the silence. 

“So, any ideas rolling around in that giant brain of yours? I can see your hair turning purple, so you must be thinking pretty hard.”

Teddy pats his hair, watching it grow so that he can see the deep purple strands between his fingers, and then lets it shrink again. He has perfect control over his abilities, but he likes to let them run free most of the time, and his hair especially likes to do what it wants. “Ideas about what?”

“Ideas to get rid of this,” James says, gesturing between them. He laughs, and the sound is a little off. “You know, so we’re not stuck to each other.”

Teddy can’t explain the sinking feeling in his stomach, but he knows it makes him feel sick. It’s silly, really, but he didn’t think James would protest to this bond, or whatever it is, not so soon anyway. He shakes himself after a moment. Of course James doesn’t want to stay stuck to him. And that doesn’t mean James likes him any less, Teddy tells himself firmly. It just means he prefers their relationship when it’s natural, untampered with. 

“I have books we can look through, but none that really cover this sort of thing,” Teddy says slowly. “I think our best bet is to send an owl to Neville and see if he can have those books sent to us, from the Restricted Section. You know, the ones you were so fond of.”

He winks at James, eyes flashing blue for a brief second. James scowls at him, and then shifts to throw himself on Teddy’s eggshell sofa, the one that used to sit in his grandmother’s spare sitting room. 

Teddy loves that sofa. He used to spend hours curled up on it with his schoolwork during the summer holidays, bare feet digging into the soft cushions. Andromeda would bustle around in the background, cleaning and scribbling letters and whistling along to the radio. Harry would pop in and out of the fireplace to sit with him during his work breaks, going through his casework and grumbling under his breath, and Draco would sometimes join them, or come alone, with a strange Muggle toy that he found fascinating or a book of puzzles for him and Teddy to work through. 

Now, it sits in the living room of Teddy’s flat, and it usually houses one of the Potter’s. James, mostly. It’s common for Teddy to come home and find James sprawled out on it, sometimes still in his Quidditch Gear, sometimes doodling in one of the sketchbooks that Scorpius often leaves cluttering up the place, and sometimes just munching Chinese food out of the carton, waiting for Teddy to get home. 

It makes him love the damn thing even more, even if the cushions are a little less plump than they were and the colour is starting to fade. The pull of the bond tugs him closer as James settles onto it, flinging one arm over his eyes and grumbling under his breath. Teddy finds himself smiling. 

‘Course, it could be that it isn’t the sofa that Teddy loves. 

*

Neville is a busy man, so Teddy isn’t surprised when he doesn’t get an answer straight away. The floo network isn’t open to just anyone, so Teddy had penned a letter pretty quickly and sent it off with Bertius, his owl. Still, Hogwarts is a fare few miles away from London, and despite being Headmaster, Neville still teaches Herbology in the day, which likely means he won’t have read it yet. 

They’ve spent the rest of the morning floo-calling everyone they need to, to tell them that James is staying with Teddy and that neither of them will be able to go into work for a while, not until they get this sorted. Luckily for James, at the tender age of twenty-one, he’s only a reserve seeker, so the team won’t suffer too badly if he misses a few practices. Teddy’s boss isn’t hard to convince either. 

In fact, Harry had taken one look at Teddy’s face, poking out of the fireplace, and had insisted on coming right over to help. 

“You’re the Head Auror,” Teddy had said, amused. “I’m pretty sure you can’t just skive off with no notice. Anyway, we’ll be fine. As long as James doesn’t find my secret stash of custard creams, I think we’ll live.”

Harry had been somewhat placated by the sound of James defending his honour in the background, loudly, and had made Teddy promise to call him when they knew something, before diving back into his paperwork. 

“I’m bored,” James says, hanging backwards off the sofa, his head brushing Teddy’s shoulder where he’s sat on the floor, surrounded by books. “Entertain me, please.”

“Would you like me to do a little dance?” Teddy asks, deadpan. “Sing a little song? Perform cartwheels in my boxers?”

James perks up a little. “That last one has potential.”

Teddy gently pushes his face away. “You could always help me with the research. There’s a whole bunch of stuff to go through. And Hermione’s going to send over some of her own information when she finishes her shift at the hospital, so we’ll have that to look at as well.”

“As tempting as that sounds, I think I’ll pass.” James pops his lips, tapping his foot where it hangs over the back of the sofa. “We could always go out, you know. See the world, that kind of thing.”

“It’s London,” Teddy says, rolling his eyes. “You practically spent every weekend here, growing up. What could possibly be left for you to see?”

“I don't think it’s what you see. I think it’s who you see it with.”

James shifts his head closer again, until his nose is pressed up against Teddy’s ear. The sensation tickles a little, and Teddy shivers. He turns his head a little warily to find James grinning at him, cat-like, a little red in the cheeks from being upside down for so long. It's a reflex, to smile back. 

“But if you don’t want to do that, can we at least nip to the shop? If I’m staying here, I need the essentials.”

“Like what?”

“Like custard creams.” James smiles mischievously, sliding off the sofa and onto the floor in a tangled heap, revealing the empty yellow packet left behind on the cushions. Teddy spends a good ten seconds trying to remember all of the reasons why he loves James, and then he puts his book down on the carpet with purpose. 

“You know, you probably shouldn’t have done that when it’s impossible for you to escape,” he says. James’s grin gets even wider, and he starts to crawl across the floor. The tug in his chest gets more pronounced, until eventually Teddy lurches forward and grabs his ankles, dragging him backwards. 

There’s a brief scuffle, full of flailing legs and yelps. They’re too old for this, really, bones grown bigger over time and bodies stockier, shoulders broader, able to carry more weight. Teddy remembers being small and young, remembers chasing James around the garden, Al at their heels, both of them yelling and play-fighting. He remembers the way the freshly-cut grass stained their shirts. He remembers the way James tipped his head back and barked laughter for the birds to hear. He remembers thinking then that James was so bright, bright in a way that warmed everyone around them to the tips of their toes, like a little scrap of walking, talking, laughing sunshine. 

“Teddy?”

Teddy zones back in and blinks down at James. He’s hovering above him, both arms either side of James’s head, bracketing him, legs tangled together. James has this slow, syrupy half-grin on his face and a question on his lips. 

“Yeah, sweets?” Teddy says unthinkingly. 

He watches the way James’s eyes widen a little. He watches the blush that starts in his cheeks, pinking up the skin, and travels down to his throat, which bobs as he swallows. It looks nice, rosy against the scattering of freckles. Teddy lifts one hand to Jamie’s cheekbone and connects a little cluster of them with his finger, one, two, three. The blush gets even deeper under his touch. 

“Just wondering if you planned on staying like this all day?” James says, and that teasing tone is a little more wobbly than usual. “Not that I mind. It’s comfy.”

Teddy pushes down the part of him that wants to curl up with James, dip his lips to James’s throat. Instead, he levers himself up onto his knees and grins down at him. One hand in another, a tug, and they’re both standing. 

“I guess we need to go to the shop after all,” Teddy says, moving to grab his coat. “I can’t survive being bonded to you if I don’t have custard creams.”

Something flickers across James’s face, and Teddy turns around so that he can’t dwell on it. He scoops his keys out of the bowl by the door, digging around under the rack for his shoes, which slip on easily. 

“Uh, Teddy?”

He turns to find James staring at him from not far away, one eyebrow raised in amusement, arms crossed loosely over his chest. 

“I know I’m a pretty free-spirited kinda person, but I don’t think London could handle it if I went out like this.” James looks down at his bare legs, and Teddy opens his mouth, then shuts it again. 

“I forgot,” he says, shrugging one shoulder sheepishly. James grins at him, full of affection. 

“Can I borrow some of your stuff?” James is already walking towards the bedroom, giving Teddy no choice but to follow, stumbling along. Teddy stands with his back turned as James folds his legs into Teddy’s jeans, pulling out his wand to Shrink them a little at the hips. He’s got a pair of his own trainers by the door, and the odd sock that he leaves lying around. He leaves the Hufflepuff top on, and throws a plaid shirt on over the top, and Teddy has to bite back all the compliments threatening to spill out of his throat. 

“Ready when you are, big guy,” James says, spreading his arms out wide. 

Teddy stops him before they leave and fumbles around on the top shelf of his wardrobe, until he withdraws an old leather jacket. 

James lights up, mouth dropping open in delight. “Oh Merlin. Please tell me that’s what I think it is.”

“A remnant from my days as an edgy youth?”

He proffers the jacket, and James slips into it eagerly. It’s a bit big on him, and Teddy’s heart flips at the sight of those too-long sleeves. There’s just something about James in his clothes that drives him a little insane. 

James laughs heartily, holding up one arm. “There’s studs on the sleeves! I think this might even rival those pictures we have of Al, when he gelled his hair across his face and wore eyeliner for a week.”

“I regret this already.”

*

Teddy gets fed up of being dragged along behind James as he races ahead, or getting jerked to a stop by the bond as James stops to pet a dog or chat to someone. He waits for James to leave the Yorkshire Terrier alone, and then grabs his hand before James can run off. 

His heart flips when James does nothing about it, just grins down at their joined hands and gives his fingers a squeeze. Then they’re off, and Teddy has to speed up a little to keep up with James’s gait, but eventually they reach the corner shop in one piece. He waves hello to Michael, who’s sat behind the counter with a bored look on his face and a magazine propped up against a display stand of half-priced flapjacks. Michael nods back, eyes flicking curiously to James, before recognition sinks in. 

It’s slightly embarrassing, but most of the people Teddy has ever interacted with know who James is. Michael knows because Teddy has often complained good-naturedly about being sent down to the shop to buy bread or cereal for him, when James has stayed over and is too lazy to go himself. The elderly lady who lives next door to him always makes sure to ask how the sweet, loud boy is doing whenever Teddy sees her. And there’s Joan, the buff woman who usually spends the morning in the elevator with Teddy, both on their way to work, and who Teddy has bemoaned James’s entire existence to more than once. 

“Come on, we need snacks,” James says, pulling Teddy further into the shop. Their hands are still joined, and Teddy can’t help but run his thumb over James’s, smoothing it over the skin. James has rough palms and fingertips from handling broomsticks all the time, no matter how much lotion he applies, but Teddy doesn’t mind. In fact, he quite likes it. 

“I don't like your idea of snacks,” Teddy says. “You may have eaten my custard creams, but I think that was a blip. You usually go so far as to count apples as a treat.”

“Fruit is full of natural sugars, and they’re sweet, so technically, they  _ are  _ a treat,” James protests, but he begrudgingly puts the bag of apples back in the tiny section of fruit at the front of the shop. “You can get custard creams, but you’re not buying any more of the ones with the pink cream inside. That’s just wrong.”

“Strawberry creams are a gift.”

“Strawberry creams are a blight against humanity.” James smacks his hand away from the packet on the shelf, and leads him down the aisle, towards the cereal. Teddy watches the biscuits get further and further away, and thinks morosely that he’s quite like this bond to be over with soon, so he can at least buy the food he wants, even if he doesn’t get to eat it. 

And then he wonders why he’s letting this bossy ignoramus determine what he eats for the week, and he shuffles forward to slip an arm around James’s waist. James looks at him askance for a moment, perusing the selection of cereal, and he doesn’t see it coming when Teddy hoists him up over his shoulder and barrels back down towards the biscuits. He hurriedly casts a Silencing Charm before James can yell bloody murder, scurrying towards the checkout with his treasures in his arms. 

Michael looks slightly alarmed, but mostly apathetic. He starts scanning Teddy’s items through at a snail’s pace, and Teddy puts on a charming smile for the scandalised-looking woman in the queue behind him. James beats his fists against Teddy’s back, and Teddy is almost definitely sure that there are some foul words escaping James’s mouth right now, but luckily, not a single person can hear them. 

He sets James down on the pavement outside and cancels the spell. James pauses with his mouth open, the back end of a curse stopped right on his bottom lip. 

“You are very lucky,” James says, “that I am not employing mum’s favourite hex right now.”

Teddy holds back a wince. He’s seen Ginny’s Bat-Bogey Hex a grand total of three times, and each was more harrowing than the last. 

“You didn’t give me much of a choice, sweetheart,” Teddy says. “Maybe that’ll teach you not to go near my secret stash of food.”

He digs around in the bag and pulls out the lollipop he’d slipped into the pile when James was busy hitting his shoulder blades, and offers it to James. James gets this glint in his eye, and he takes the lollipop slowly, unpeeling the wrapper and offering Teddy a sweet smile before popping it into his mouth. 

Teddy watches the way his cheeks hollow when he sucks, and groans internally. He has a feeling that revenge is going to be swift and deadly. 

*

Teddy’s apartment has two beds. Well, technically, Teddy’s apartment has one bed that he sleeps in, and a conjured camping bed that gets shoved in the hallway closet every time one of the Potter’s finally rolls their way out of it, the afternoon following a sleepover. Teddy doesn’t like to call them sleepovers, really, because he’s not twelve, but Al likes to drily inform him that that’s what they are, and so Teddy can’t exactly complain without being called an illogical arse. Or a stick-in-the-mud, if it’s James doing the name-calling. 

So there are two beds, and yet, when night comes, and James tries to lie down on the camping bed, with Teddy more than a few feet away, that fact suddenly seems irrelevant. 

Teddy sighs, one knee on the bed. He can’t move any further forward, but he can move backwards, towards James. James, who has his elbow propped up, grinning widely at Teddy’s predicament from the floor. He’s comfortably tucked into under several quilts, illuminated by the soft light from the bedside table. 

“I know it’s hard, but try not to enjoy this so much,” Teddy tells him, and in return, James leans backwards, and then rolls off the camping bed and onto the floor. Teddy’s knee lifts off the mattress, quite without his permission, and he staggers backwards a little, one foot landing amongst the tangled quilts. James cackles at him from beneath the mess of blankets. 

“What was that, sorry? Couldn’t quite hear you,” James says. He looks quite pleased with himself. Teddy gives in to baser instincts, and collapses on top of James, letting most of his weight land on James’s top half. The fall makes something swoop in his stomach, which he’s always hated, but the sound James makes more than makes up for it. 

“Christ,” James wheezes. He wriggles one hand out from underneath Teddy’s bulk and slaps him on the chest. “Get off me. I think you splintered my spleen.”

“You brought this on yourself,” Teddy says, cheerfully enough. He makes a big show of yawning, cracking his jaw as he puts his arms behind his head, settling down. “Boy, I’m tired. I think I may just have a little nap right here, on top of this scrawny cushion.”

“There’s a reason you’re an Auror and not a comedian,” James grumbles. “Alright, alright. Just get up, and I won’t do it again.”

“You’re damn right, you won’t,” Teddy says. “Because apparently you’ll be staying in my bed tonight, and I only let guys into my bed if they promise to be good.”

It’s only  _ after  _ the words leave his mouth that he realises just how they sound. The strained silence and the suddenly still body underneath him makes him suck in a breath, and he swallows around the sound of his own heartbeat in his ears. 

“That… uh, that so?” James clears his throat. His voice is rough and strange, like he hasn’t used it in a while. Teddy rolls off him and gets to his feet, stepping as far back as possible. James scrambles up to meet him, eyes carefully averted. 

Teddy can’t help but feel a rush of terror. It’s not often that James can’t meet his gaze, and he’s worried that he’s overstepped, that he’s made James uncomfortable, that he just ruined something between them. The ease, perhaps, with which they love each other. 

But then he notices the blush. 

It’s at his cheeks, travelling slowly down his throat, and Teddy flicks his eyes down to where James is fiddling with the hem of his shirt, a nervous tick. 

His grin is a slow thing, but it comes steadily, and he wipes it away before James can see. He reaches over to curl his fingers around James’s wrist. 

“Jamie,” Teddy says, voice low. “Come to bed.”

James’s eyes widen, and he freezes, before shuffling forward awkwardly. All of his usual suave attitude is gone, down the drain, and Teddy’s left with this quieter, shyer version of James. A version he doesn’t think anybody else has seen before. 

“I get the right side,” James says, coughing until his voice comes out properly. Teddy grins down at him, affection swelling up inside of him. 

“Sure thing, love.” 

That makes James look up, his gaze sharp. He studies Teddy’s face, and Teddy leaves his expression open, makes sure to pour every inch of love he feels for this boy into his smile. He sees the way James swallows, and he steps back to give him some space, cocking his head at the bed. 

James crawls across the covers until he’s settled in on the right side, tucking the blanket up to his chin. Teddy snorts, shaking his head as he tucks himself into the left side. There’s a bit of a gap between them, and Teddy leaves it there, because James still looks a little stiff and shocked, like he’s not sure what’s going on. 

Truthfully, Teddy isn’t sure either. He knows he loves James, and he’s pretty sure that James knows that now, too. He knows that James feels comfortable enough to flirt with him constantly, but he doesn’t know if any of that is real, or if he’d rather have Teddy as a best friend. Either one is fine with Teddy, but he can’t deny that he wants one of them more than the other. He wants James, in every way he can have him. 

He reaches over to flick off the lamp, dousing the room in darkness. Every breath feels loud in the silence, and he tries to steady his breathing, settling back into the bed the way he would usually. 

James is stiff as a board beside him, arms tucked in close at his sides. 

Teddy grins. “You know, I’ve seen vampires that sleep in more comfortable positions.”

James doesn’t say anything for a moment, and then he sighs, long and loud and disgruntled, and wriggles around until he’s more comfortable. The mattress squeaks underneath him, and Teddy gets elbowed a couple of times. Gradually, the gap gets smaller. 

“Do you know a lot of vampires?” James says, his voice close enough to make Teddy jump. 

“Oh yeah. Loads of them.”

“Name one.”

“Pretty sure Draco was a vampire in a past life.”

James chuckles into Teddy’s shoulder. Teddy slips an arm underneath him, wrapping it around his waist. He’s going to have a dead arm in the morning, but he doesn't care. His heart is in his throat, thrumming wildly, and James’s breath is a little shaky, but he’s warm against Teddy. 

“Mr Malfoy is pretty pasty, I’ll give you that. But I don't think he’s a vampire.”

“You haven’t seen the way he puts away red wine,” Teddy says. “I think it’s an echo from a previous lifetime.”

“You’re such a nerd,” James says, giving in and laughing. His arm slings itself over Teddy’s chest, fist curling into his shirt. Teddy presses his face into James’s hair and grins. 

“You love it.”

Maybe that’s a little far. Maybe that's a little much. But Teddy doesn’t move, just waits, and James breathes out, shaking his head ruefully. 

“‘Course I do, you total knob. I don't know what I have to do to make you see it."

Teddy can’t take this any more. He reasons, even as he breaks the hushed, intimate mood by leaning down and kissing James fiercely, that they’ll have plenty of time for hushed, intimate moments later on. And when James kisses back just as fiercely, Teddy realises that he hasn’t broken the mood at all, but he may have just fixed something very deep inside him that was waiting for him to get his arse in gear. 

“Pillock,” James says, against his lips. “Took you long enough.”

Teddy laughs into their next kiss. 

*

When Teddy wakes in the morning, the bond is broken. He knows it before he gets out of bed to fetch coffee, but that reaffirms his suspicions. He has no idea where it came from, or why it’s gone, but he has a feeling it has something to do with the kiss. He can figure it out later, but for now, there are more important things to attend to. 

James is lying on his front, taking up most of the bed, and Teddy moves away from the tempting line of his bare spine in order to pen a quick letter to Neville. 

He hurries back to bed, two coffees floating in to land on the bedside table. The sheets are rucked down to James’s hips, and Teddy leaves them there. He spends a good few minutes just staring, an incredible amount of happiness swirling around inside of him. 

And then he lifts a hand and brushes it against bare skin. There are freckles everywhere, and Teddy makes sure to visit them one by one, pressing the pad of each finger gently into each one. 

“What are you doing?” James’s voice is hoarse and deep from sleep, and he turns his head against the pillow until he can see Teddy, shifting slightly. Teddy moves onto the next freckle, and leans down to press a kiss to it. A shudder runs up James’s spine, and Teddy feels it under his lips. 

“Counting,” Teddy says. 

“You’ll be here a while.” James’s eyes are bright and crinkled at the corners, warm and full of love. 

Teddy grins lazily, savouring another shiver, another freckle, another kiss. 

“That’s the plan.”

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! <3


End file.
